Official Sony VAIO F Series i5/i7 owners thread *Part 3*

All summer w/o a computer? Not sure I could do that.

Thanks for the XT feedback.

"...after using your guide I could not find both the Arcsoft webcam programs on the recovery discs when using VAIO_Care.
I also liked the Sony_branded support information and I lost most of the VAIO Care hardware diagnostics" - That's strange as I found Webcam Companion on it, look below third from the bottom. Also for the_F11, I did not install separately Hardware Diagnostics, it was part of Vaio_Care. Maybe it's a question of order of installation. OTOH, I don't remember if Vaio_Help & Support and Vaio_User Guide had to be installed separately or if it was included in Vaio_Care. Anyway it's available on esupport, by hitting ASSIST & on the recovery disc in my case but since yours is an EU model, it could explain the difference.

 

why no info until oct? both the estimated shipping date and the phone rep from head office said mid sept. if so, specs should be out same time then or even by early sept. and a sept release date would be much earlier than holiday season.

just wondering why you don't believe the two sources of information thus far on the F13 directly from Sony. Both also originating from Sony Canada, where the only information on the F13s has come from at this point. is there any reason to doubt a mid sept release?

 

Mid September + order/delivery delay = mid October.

Intel always put an embargo on the info about their new CPU's before they themselves officially announce it. Surely that incomplete F13 page on Sony_CA was not meant to be published. It's like a place holder, a work in progress. I'm sure that Sony_did not break the embargo on purpose.

 

Howdy guys. I'm new here, and I was wondering if any of you guys know what firewire chipset is in the current VAIO F series. if you don't know, you can either run lspci or lshw in linux, or run AIDA32 in windows.

also, was wondering if it shares an IRQ with another device, because i'm going to be doing audio with it.

Thanks!

 

Clean install successfully accomplished using the recovery partition ! Worked 1st time.

Touchpad not working so I will need to go into Vaio Control Centre when I can to disable/reenable in Vaio Control Centre once my S1 key works, does not at the moment.

Good news is my retrofit US backlit keyboard is working perfectly because on configuring the system, I was given the option of selecting which keyboard i was using !

 

Hey guys, I've had my CTO Vaio F12 for 2 weeks now and have finally purchased a bluray disc to test out the drive..

So I've bought a European copy of District 9 and I've spent the last hour trying to get it to play on various bits of software. Both the bundled Corel player and a trial of PowerDVD crash - I don't even get to a menu!
After a little googling, I even tried using something called Anydvd to disable the BD-Live features, as well as just turning off my internet connection...still no joy

Anybody got some advice? Should I be looking to update the drive's firmware?

 

I see. I hadn't expected a shipping delay for the F13s since they are new. I always associated delays with in demand options after initial batches running out, and needing to re-order, such as with the 330Ms. So for example, if estimated shipping date is Sept 14, I would expect it to ship around that time for everybody who ordered first. Then perhaps other estimated dates needing to be pushed back due to shortages with second and third and fourth wave orders.

Regardless of actual shipping date, IF the F13s are offered in mid Sept, detailed specifications should be up then too.

 

VAIO_key defaults to mute if you did not install Sony_Media. Start > search: Vaio_Control Center > Special Buttons > and you can assign S1 there.

You can disable/enable the touchpad in Device Manager or Control Panel\All Control Panel Items > Mouse. Or uninstall/re-install Alps driver.

Edit: Did you do the "Installing the Useful VAIO Software" step yet? If not, then that's why the special buttons are not working yet.

 

Not sure if this is your issue, but in case it is, it might solve it:

I'm going to assume based on your post that you're located in North America or at least a non Euro/UK region. If so, your blu ray drive should be region locked against the disc. On computer players, there is an option where you can change the region of the discs you can play. It's usually limited to a few changes like 3-4, so you can't keep switching it. In North American drives, we are set to region A by default. Your disc is region B. Since you can only change regions a limited amount of time, it's up to you if it's worth it to change it for this one movie. If you have a lot of region B discs then it might be more worthwhile.

EDIT: nm the above. just looked at your profile and you have the UK premium display, which means you are in the UK! the only thing I can think of that would give you playback problems is BD-Live, but you said you tried turning off your internet and it still doesn't work. did you turn off WiFi on your laptop too (taskbar/sliding button)? could it be that the player is searching for a net connection and crashing due to it?

 

Just doing it Joe ... S1 key and touch pad are working now. But ASSIST key is not, any pointers ?

BTW how do you get the original Win7 startup logo and the original wallpaper back ?

 

Thanks for the suggestions, you're correct- I'm in the UK! So far I've tried both the sliding button & the taskbar methods for deactivating the internet, to no avail!
You'd think they would make it easy to opt out of these "extra value" features! Sadly most of the information on the nets end up with people making backups of the film to circumvent the BD-live.

 

I'll pop in a BD-Live disc later to see what happens when I try playing it, and if I can get around it. I recall one of the most problematic BD-Live titles for players was Iron Man, so I'll try that and see.

 

My UK F11 firewire is a Ricoh and shares an IRQ with the following...

GFX chip
USB Enhanced Host Controller
Chipset PCI Express Root Port 1
CPU PCI Express Root Port 1

 

I am burning recovery discs now - thanks for the heads up.

There has to be some way to get the Media Gallery software, right? I guess I have to contact Sony support.

 

The "Assist" button opens Vaio Care. Perhaps you do not have Vaio Care installed yet?

 

Firstly has anyone here who owns f11 or f12 vaio tried using dcp latency checker? I am really curious to see if anyone else has the same spikes i get every 30 seconds. I get 3 large spikes does not matter if its factory restored to a clean install. If anyone is wiling to dload the free small app and report back i would be very happy for some feedback. DPC Latency Checker

Well that being said. I finally sent my vaio f11 to good ole San Diego,ca. So its been sittin there a few days and the lovely esupport site is fairly slow about updating the repair status. besides the fed ex track # proof of delivery it would be nice of them to @ least state that it is in their possession and being redied for repair.

What I was told by the local teir 2 team is that my problem was unique! And so it needs to go to the research team for examination. Yeah right IMO i told them not to bs me and figuire out what the deal is. I also mentioned to them to just send me damn new one. Thats what dell did when my 1720 had scratches from deivery and they sent me a top of line model in place of my budget cto.

I called sony customer affairs complained about how they handled their business compared to the service i just metioned from dell. Anyways I would really prefer that they get to the root cause of my machines problem which lies wit in the i link and the wlan interface from previous testing with sony tech support.

Now the question is this. Does sony actually fix your unit? I know with my broken ps3 they just sent me a refurb. Im betting they put new internal parts but I wouldnt mind sony sending me a new unit maybe even an f12. Now im probably asking to much here but when I get a letter stating that I need a bios update because my unit could overheat, well i just dont have much faith in that condition. I dunno if the f12 boards fit in the f11s' but I guess ill soon find out.

Anyone feel like sharing their service repair story or latency feedback with me please oblige yourself and thanks in advance.

 

Im a musician and mine is at Sony's service center because the i link drops out. I would hold out until I get my unit back so I can see what the fix was.

Btw I use a M-audio firewire 4/10 interface which works on all my other lappys.

 

Maybe the F is not the problem but the chip type. Check MelodyMaster's posts about it:

He was replying to this post about M-Audio & F problems.

You sound happy that you found that latency thing in relation to your M-Audio: an opportunity to haggle & get an upgrade to a new_F12.

You complained to customer affairs because they are repairing it under warranty instead of upgrading it or giving you a new unit? Did I misunderstood?

I'm a noob when it comes to audio BTW.

I ran your utility as requested while I had a bunch of programs opened & my ODD in an external enclosure connected via USB:

 

Hi to all from South Carolina. My first post to this group - have been reading regularly since April this year when got interested in the F series. Ended up getting a VPC-F11JFX/B from Sonystyle in May. All in all, very happy with this machine - the best I've ever owned/used! OK - could improve the screen (glare/reflections) and unless angled to viewer at sweet spot, some light bleed at bottom. But - so long as in sweet spot, a great picture!

Purpose of this note is first to thank all members who contribute so much. It helped me make a decision. Secondly, got something today which is new (to me) - a Bluetooth Speaker from Yamaha. Model NX-B02. Small footprint and quickly connected to my F11 (Bluetooth). A BIG improvement in sound over the built in 'speakers' of the F11. Learned about it from special sale e-mail from CompUSA. $50 shipped (list was $200.) I'm running on AC (small transformer) but it will also run on 4 AA batteries. Haven't tried batteries - poop sheet with speaker says expect about 5 hours on batteries.

I do lots of home video/photo editing and quite pleased with sound. I've also tried a good portable pair - Logitech's model V10. Connects to USB and big improvement over the F11's speakers but not nearly as good as the Yamaha Bluetooth.

For what it's worth for those interested in a speaker improvement. Neither of these are 'audiophile' quality but sound good and much better than the F11's speakers with a no-hassle hookup. Also, I've got an older Sony SZ750n/c that has bluetooth support and the Yamaha 'mates' with it in a heartbeat. So which ever notebook I'm using, have an instant sound improvement!

Regards to all,
Tom

 

thanks for the rapid response!

what are your other laptops, if i may inquire? i need to be able to do recording, and as much of a beast as the F series is, if it's not fixable, i'm going with something else. i like the idea of 1080p for ample work space, too, though.

thanks again.

 

The M-audio USB interfaces, along with all other legacy sound cards, will not work properly on the F-series' Ricoh firewire port, Period. There is no fix. You should look in the audio forums before wasting Sony's time and subjecting your system to wear and tear. I've been there, as have others, it simply can't be done. I use a desktop Shuttle E6400 system for those audio apps that won't work on the F11. ALL laptops are now moving away from the TI chip. You must have older systems.

If you want to work with legacy audio hardware you need to get a laptop with the Texas Instruments chip, such as a Dell or Mac.

 

legacy. rofl nice job trying to make sony look good.

 

so i finally decided to buy the F12. I like it so far but have one small complaint. Even when I am doing nothing, no windows up no nothing, the fan sounds like it's running on full power. it's loud and constant. is this normal?

 

hi,I want to check my vaio serial number via sony website,but I can`t found anything.
I use the link below but it doesn`t accept my serial number.

http://support.vaio.sony.eu/computing/vaio/programs/f11cw2/index.aspx

may be because of my vaio is made in china & it`s F12 series.
my vaio model is F123 fx made in china but for canada & america demands.
pls help.

 

Fan indeed doesnt stop because Core i7 in idle have temperatures of 45-55C so indeed it must be constantly cooled. Although if your fan is loud constant as it would be 100% stressed then apply new bios update or call the Sony Support.

 

thanks. if only someone had mentioned this before...... i know it was brought up but it was never really emphasized. i've had this laptop for a day and i'm already annoyed by the fan.

 

I bought F12 3 days ago,it has no fan noise,check the power managment & set it on balanced profrmance.

 

it is on balanced power. the fan wasnt that bad until the laptop automatically restarted itself for some strange reason. the screen went to a blue page, said there was a problem and then proceeded to restart.

 

one time I wanted to install a program and the system freezed for some reason!!
I turned of the vaio with the power bottom and when I turned it on it goes to the blue screen & it starts to check the system but after the checking it goes to check again.
I remove the disc and turn it off again with power buttom and after I turn it on again it goes normal,but after that I`m experiencing some lags and I notice that my vaio is slower.
I think it`s better for us to recover our vaio and install programs with more attention.

 

It is installed but ASSIST button still does not work.

Also on reinstalling some apps and drivers from Vaio Care from my recovery partition a few wobblies were encountered:

- IPS driver (for NVIDIA I think), a window said the "Computer does not meet the minimum requirements for installing the software", "try uninstalling the IPS driver if already installed", which it may have been. How can I check the IPS driver is working OK, if already installed ?

- "Vaio power management did not install properly", I previously installed this from Vaio esupport I think but it did not go through the typical Install shield which is why I tried it again. Is this meant to be the case ? How can I check power management is working OK ?

BTW how do you get the original F11 Vaio startup screen video back , you know the black background and rotating colours ? And the original wallpaper back ? I miss them ! I downloaded Vaio Screensaver and Vaio Wallpaper Contents from VaioCare already.

Thanks in advance.

 

please help....

 

This image doesn't really say anything because the time interval is only 30 seconds long and it doesn't state how long that DPC latency checker has been running (it could literally be just 30 seconds for all we know).

This news does not bode well for me because I produce my own music and DPC latency is an absolute deal killer for me. Unfortunately, there are only a handful of notebooks that have TI firewire chipsets (MBPs and some HPs). MBP is way too expensive for me and HP has a terrible reputation for reliability. I was hoping to get the F12 anyway and 'fix' the issue by disabling most or all of the fancy extras like the camera, wireless etc and get lucky.

Deferred Procedure Call (DPC) latency is caused by low level system drivers pushing to the front of the data execution queue. When you stream audio, it is buffered into little blocks separated by interrupts and continuously fed from the buffer to the ad/da converter and vice versa.

If some critical low level system driver pushes its way to the front of the queue and takes too long to execute (i.e. because its very badly written), a new interrupt triggers the next buffer before the last one finished processing and you get a drop out.

In practice it can produce lots of strange and undesirable effects - cpu load shoots through the roof causing some plugins and signal processors to hang. Audio stutters, pops and crackles and you have to increase DMA/ASIO buffer size to avoid it which creates more latency (and after a certain point it can make my synth keyboard completely unplayable because theres too much delay on keystroke and I completely lose the feel and tactility of the thing).

Theres no way to tell from DPC Latency Checker what system drivers are jumping the queue so right now the general consensus is to run DPC Latency Checker continuously and to disable device drivers one at a time until the problem goes away. To do this thoroughly can take weeks or maybe you'll get lucky. I've heard that its mostly wifi but it could really be anything and it could be critical system drivers that you can't just disable and expect your computer to turn on and run normally.

 

Well, I also have the F12 (now for 3 days) and REALLY happy with it

Man it is pretty and it is quick (did the clean install on a new 320 Momentus XT - will paste benchmarks later - seems to be the "in thing to do")

I always wear earphones or the TV is always on, or usually just ZONE out when working - so the fan is a NON-issue for me (althought you can hear it...)

Return your F12 if it is really a problem....

 

I feel your pain, but are there no TI ExpressCard Firewire adaptors?

Google gives me:

Create Digital Music ExpressCard FireWire that Actually Works for Audio?

Good luck!

 

I'm just skimming through, so don't know if you got the ASSIST button working. You need to install VAIO Event Service to get your Fn buttons, ASSIST and S1 to work.

 

I've got a US release of District 9 and it loads fine, as well as my 20 other blu ray movies. I'm not sure that BD-Live is an issue. I have to manually connect to the internet, cuz I tether through my cell phone, and am not usually online while watching a movie. BD-Live is a feature that you select in the main menu and then it seeks the internet.

Do you have access to another blu ray movie you can try? Can you try your copy of District 9 in another player and see what happens? I'd hate for you to be troubleshooting all of your software if you actually have a bad disc.

 

I think you can do this if you buy an expresscard with a TI chipset and if you can disable or better yet, completely remove the Ricoh firewire controller but doing this would solve one problem and create another.

Unfortunately, one of the things many computer music folks also need alot of is USB ports which are in short supply on many laptops these days.

I had intended to use the expresscard slot to get a couple more USBs since when I setup shop to record, I'll usually need all of this plugged in:

1) MIDI interface
2) Virus TI Keyboard
3) Mixer
4) External Storage
5) Mouse

Fortunately, I don't use any software that requires a USB dongle otherwise I'd start to have real problems. Thats just the critical stuff too since if I had a spare port I'd probably plug my phone in too.

The solution is not as simple as using a hub either since some of those devices do not like sharing USB ports for bandwidth. Virus TI is a bandwidth hog and regularly cries when it has to port share. Mixer doesn't like to share. My external hard drive needs power over the esata/usb combo port and its a bandwidth hog.

 

Hi,

I tried to install VAIO Event Service from the esupport page, but then I ran it, it asked if i wanted to uninstall it. I presumed I must already have it so I canceled uninstallation. I could try it again, ie. uninstall then install.

My S1 key works. How do I check if the fn keys work, I never use them day to day ?

BTW, Google Chrome was available in Vaio Care but I did not install it. I need to see if i already have it anyway, if I do I will uninstall it.

 

Well, there's a trailer for the Michael Jackson movie on the disc which plays fine! The specific bit at which it crashes is just after there is a human and alien symbol displayed. I've read that this is supposed to be a menu of sorts.
I'll probably have to wait till the weekend sometime to test the disc on another player - I've read several forums mentioning the disc causes their (fat) PS3s to hang for 15mins or so (attributed to the BD-Live, they say)
Thanks for the info!

 

I’ve been working on my laptop (the VPCF11M1E, the one with the i5-520M) for over 5 months.
One of the first things I did was installing a color profile because the colors were so wrong (too much bleu).
I send it back after one week because of a high-pitch sound occurred when I plugged in an USB-device. After three weeks I received it back with the nice cleaning cloth and a new shielding pad. This didn’t solved the problem and I learned myself to live with it because I didn’t want to lose it for another long time.
The next months I worked on it every day for my master’s thesis, it never turned me down. I worked in a quiet room and the high-pitched sound was noticeable but easy to ignore when you were concentrating on something else than the noise.
After completing the thesis I started to play games on it, Empire Total War and Napoleon total war both run very smooth and slick. I installed a new hard drive WD3200BEKT. I tried a fresh install following JB his guide but it failed me twice so I decided to do a semi fresh install, which cost me a lot of time.
After that the startup time, measured with VAIO Care, decreased from 2:42 min to 1:42 with 10 startup-programs (the same as with the old HDD).
The old HDD went in an external case with power over e-sata.
I’m very happy with it and I still read the this great forum. Thanks you folks for all your contributions.

 

First, if you could tell us what the rpm is and what are the tasks that your F is running or CPU activity, that would be great trouble shooting info. Mine is at about 3,000 rpm @ idle working in a room at about 22-24c, with the back of the laptop propped up on a stick about 2cm thick.



Download the free trial of Everest v5.50. Under File > Preferences > OSD > OSD Items, select CPU, HDD, Fan, etc like I did below. You can also edit the labels. For example it said CPU in the last line, I changed to Fan Speed as that what it is. and use the Windows 7 Snipping Tool (included in your OS) to make a screen capture that you can attach to your post. You can do the same with Start > Search: Task Manager. Mine for example:



If your F is not running significantly more Processes or tasks compared to the above and the fan is spinning much faster then resetting the CMOS fixed the problem for about 10 F owners so far in these threads. Here is the fix but please do the above BEFORE and after resetting the CMOS for everybody's benefit. If your F's fan is running @ about 3,000 rpm and it's too noisy for you then maybe you bought the wrong notebook and would be better served with an i3 or i5 CPU for less fan work and better battery life. The F is a muscle car with power to eat heavy tasks for breakfast, it's not designed as a casual quiet light task laptop.

 

They are all made in China @ Foxconn, what matters is for which market it was made. Searching the web w/ VPCF123FX, I found this Sony_B2B page with a link to Support which brought me to the Sony_US support page for your model: VPCF123FX.

Since the home page for your model does not say that it needs a BIOS update, then it DOES NOT need a BIOS update. If you run Vaio_Update (Start > search or icon near clock), it will tell you if you need an update or not. If after all that you are still unsure, call your US_support, use Skype or whatever if you are living elsewhere.

*****

 

It's not my fault if the utility you asked us to run does not not show for how long it is been running. I ran it 5 minutes with several programs and an external ODD running as I said. Maybe you missed the diagnostic of your utility that I took the time to add a red arrow pointing at it?



Fellow F owners, please run his utility (For more that 30 sec.) and report here:

Any other utility you would like me to to run on my F?

 

This was not after a restart- left it running for quite some time.

 

I downloaded and ran this utility for 5 minutes. This was the result:



Then, I stopped and restarted this utility and here is the spike I got when restarting:



I was able to create this spike nearly every time that I opened a new program.

If you are seeing spikes like these and you are NOT opening programs, my guess would be that you have a background program or process that is causing them. Perhaps a disk indexing program, Google updater, Adobe updater or something of that sort. I am fairly certain that it has nothing to do with the F11 hardware or drivers.

 

+ 1 for that post!

I like your troubleshooting mind process. 98% of the time it's the user or it's settings or the modifications made to the computer or programs & tasks running in the background, just like the HDD average transfer rates thing.

@ Fishon: What happens if you run it in Safe Mode or kill any background tasks or opened programs on the taskbar?

*****

OEM Clean Install Problems

tausif, where did you see in the OEM clean install guide that you have to install the "IPS driver" & whatnot? That OEM clean install procedure installs automatically 15 drivers & patches (on my_F11) w/o the need to install any other drivers manually. That's the point of using that instead of a generic Win 7 OS.

If you have some special buttons not working then you did not follow exactly what I wrote in the red box titled: " Installing the Useful VAIO_Software". What happens if you: Start > search: Vaio_Control Center? If the program is there then it was properly installed but you did not respect the installation order and that may have affected the special button assignments (or mapping).

After the first boot in Windows, the system should have created automatically a restore point. I suggest you go back there (the clean install state before you started messing up) and do it again. Forget about the wall paper and startup screen, you could easily fix that after everything is working properly.

 

Perhaps I was a bit hasty...

I just spent exactly one hour watching this latency utility. I used a split screen and watched the Windows advanced system monitor. When the spikes occurred, there was really no change in CPU, Memory, Disk or Network usage. I could find no reliable program or process to pin these spikes on...and I WAS still getting them every few minutes. The only process that kept creeping up was a System Disconnect process (I will re-check the exact name in a few moments).

I went through several drivers, disabling them one at a time and watching the utility graph for 3 minutes for each action. None stopped the spikes, although several lowered the latency. The biggest was my GT 330M. When I disabled it, my average latency (just guessing from watching as there is no such column on the utility display) went from around 250 with a range of 120-370, to an average of perhaps 125 with a range from 75-160. Of course, I did still have spikes, and I have not yet been able to stop them.

I tried all audio and video drivers and all of the Ricoh drivers (firewire, memory stick and a third one...memory card reader?) with no absolute stoppage of the spikes.

I have to leave for a few hours and I will look into this more later.

 

Using process explorer I killed many programs while watching the test. Same observation as Will- lowered the latency a little but still experienced the spiking. Opening programs produced spikes for sure. I'm at work so can't afford to get into safe mode at this time.

 

Joe,

OK I thought the guide was not necessarily all inclusive and as IPS was something to do with NVIDIA, I thought it was relevant. There were many other installs available on the recovery partition Vaio care, IPS was there as well as Google Chrome which I did not install.

i tried to follow the order and did almost to the letter but Vaio Location Utility is not on EU Esupport. Also Notebook Utilities are all separate downloads. (BTW, there was no 'keep value added content' option ealier on)

Do I really need to go to the Restore point ? I spent so much time doing the downloads from esupport, and vaio care i would have to do them again ?

After installing the stuff from esupport, other stuff I installed from Vaio Care:

Bluetooth Driver broadcom
chipset driver intel
colour setting file
devices and printers Ricoh registry patchy
ethernet driver marvel
evernote
flash player
google toolbar
graphics driver NVIDIA
IPS driver
memory card reader x3 installs
pointing device ALPS
SATA driver Intel non-RAID
Sony FW extension parser
Vaio BD movie data
Vaio Control colour setting
vaio data restore tool
vaio power management
vaio screensaver
Vaio smart network (same as smartWi I think)
Vaio userguide
Vaio wallpaper contents
WinDVD
Wireless LAN driver Atheros
Wireless LAN driver Intel

 

Before leaving, I shut down my Ethernet driver and I still spiked, so I re-enabled it and disabled the Atheros wireless adapter. Twenty five minutes later I have returned and my highest spike is just over 1000 and there are no problems according to the utility.

Try disabling the wireless card and see if the problem goes away.

Edit: By the way, the utility program did not work at all in safe mode or in safe mode with networking.